How do you manage the arrival of a bad boss?
- Support their success, work round their weaknesses
- Don’t let the bad-boss’ behaviour be an excuse for you to behave badly
- Speak up… I know, easier said than done
- Adapt to their preferences…
…or leave.
A Danish study of 4,500 public service workers, by psychologist Matias Brødsgaard Grynderup, pretty much tells us what we know.
People don’t leave bad jobs, they leave bad bosses.
The Porter Study of mergers tells us, at the first sign of trouble, 18% of top performers leave.
They figure; why should I stay here, to be pushed around and maybe get the chop. I know I’m good and I’m going someplace where they want good people.
Bosses turn bad for all sorts of reasons. Insecurity, inability, inexperience, outshone by their staff.
Or, it might be, they just want to hang on to their job and think they have to mimic the behaviour of their boss.
A bullying boss usually has a bullying boss.
It’s happening right now in the NHS. Secretary of State, Bully-Boy-Barclay (3Bs), isn’t called that, for no reason. As the HSJ pointed out… he has form.
Barclay’s background tells us a lot;
He tried being a soldier but not for long.
He thought he’d be a lawyer, but not for long.
He worked in finance but not for long…
… and tipped into politics with practically no experience or training in management, running things, creating wealth, opportunity or jobs and leaves me wondering if he’s aggressive because he suffers from imposter syndrome.
If the polls are to be believed 3Bs (Bully-Boy-Barclay) has backed the wrong horse. He’s a Sunak man. Truss is tipped to win.
Truss could abandon 3Bs, dangling him to run the NHS during what will be the worst winter on record. Watch him fail. Put in her own disciple, for the rescue.
Or, get shot of him, from-the-off. I’m hearing Thérèse Coffey is in the running.
Does it matter?
To 3Bs, yes…
… excluding allowances 3Bs gets paid £84k. As a secretary of state, he’s on another £35k. Just like you, 3Bs has got a couple of kids and a lecky-bill to pay.
It explains a lot.
His likely-new boss plans to divert funds away from the NHS, to social care. She personally supported cuts to the NHS budget, said people should be charged for appointments and doctor’s pay should be cut by 10%.
Why did she say all that?
Another manager basher, shadow health secretary Wes Streeting, complained of NHS pen pushers; ‘leeching cash away from frontline medical staff’. It’s not true and he’s since, desperately tried to row back from saying it.
Streeting suffers from the Tarzan Syndrome… compulsive chest beating.
It is politics, folks… they all do it.
Lizzie was ‘doing-a-Margaret’, entertaining the Blue Rinsers on the campaign trail. Showing how tough she is.
Most politicians are not very bright. But, they are just bright enough to know what they have to say, to keep them in the spotlight.
If the boss is ‘tough on the NHS’… and 3Bs wants to hang onto £120k a year, it’s a good idea to demonstrate how tough he is.
That’s why, last Thursday, 3Bs made a ludicrous and deeply insulting speech, headlining;
‘Excess management has become a burden on the NHS front line.’
He’s not saying it because it’s true. It isn’t.
He’s saying it to dazzle, Dizzy Lizzie. Showing how tough he is. Chest-beating. Telling her, he eats three Brillo Pads for breakfast.
For the record;
- Two pounds in every hundred is spent administering the NHS.
- Mangers make up 2% of the workforce.
- Outside the NHS, managers, directors and senior officials in the UK as a whole, make up 9.5% of the workforce.
- About a third of managers are also clinicians.
- The NHS spends about half the OECD average on admin and planning; 1.5% of its budget Compared to 4.1% in France and 7.9% in the US.
- Lack of IT investment means one in seven hospitals are still using paper based records.
- The NHS spends £361,491 a minute and cares for nearly 7,000 people, every sixty seconds. Somebody has to organise it.
- The number of posts lying vacant across the NHS in England has reached a record high of 132,139 – almost 10% of its planned workforce.
3Bs and all politicians, would do well to remember…
… the NHS is one of the biggest, most vital and difficult ministerial appointments in HMG and…
… does not exist to provide a career ladder, a leg-up, or a stepping stone…
… ambition can be the sign of character. People who have it can do very good or very bad things…
… it all depends on their principles.
News and Comment from Roy Lilley
Contact Roy – please use this e-address roy.lilley@nhsmanagers.net
Reproduced at thetrainingnet.com by kind permission of Roy Lilley.
